Zeelandic

Zeelandic
Zeêuws
Native toZeeland
(Netherlands)
Native speakers
(undated figure of 220,000)[1]
Early forms
Zeelandic alphabet (Latin)
Language codes
ISO 639-3zea
Glottologzeeu1238
Linguasphere52-ACB-af
Distribution of Zeelandic (blue) within the Dutch language area (grey)
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

Zeelandic (Zeeuws: Zeêuws; Dutch: Zeeuws; West Flemish: Zêeuws) is a group of language varieties spoken in the southwestern parts of the Netherlands. It is currently considered a Low Franconian dialect of Dutch, but there have been movements to promote the status of Zeelandic from a dialect of Dutch to a separate regional language, which have been denied by the Dutch Ministry of Internal Affairs.[2] More specifically, it is spoken in the southernmost part of South Holland (Goeree-Overflakkee) and large parts of the province of Zeeland, with the notable exception of eastern Zeelandic Flanders.[3]

It has notable differences from Standard Dutch mainly in pronunciation but also in grammar and vocabulary, which separates it clearly from Standard Dutch. This makes mutual intelligibility with speakers of Standard Dutch difficult.

  1. ^ Zeelandic at Ethnologue (15th ed., 2005) Closed access icon
  2. ^ Hoekman, Jacob (2004-07-28). "Digibron.nl, Zeeuwen zullen waarschijnlijk nooit een taal spreken". Digibron.nl (in Dutch). Retrieved 2021-03-25.
  3. ^ Marco Evenhuis. "Zeelandic". Language in the Netherlands. Streektaal.net. Retrieved 2007-06-03. Together with West-Flemish and the Flemish spoken in northern France, Zeeuws is part of a cluster of remarkably homogenic dialects Dutch versions: Zeeuws or as pdf